Understanding my concern, Richard--my wonderful, caring, beautiful husband--decided to take over for me. Here is how the paper turned out:
(There is an intro, but it's long and I won't bore you.). . . . Now, for an author to create a young character with adult-like coping abilities doesn’t seem like a hard task, since the author is presumably an adult himself. He could draw on his experiences as an adult and simply infuse them into his brilliantly crafted young adult character. However, in the case of The Outsiders, a novel brimming with troubled young adults making mature adult-like decisions, the author’s ability to infuse her juvenile characters with adult wisdom seems unlikely. S.E. Hinton, the author of The Outsiders, was only a young adult herself when she put pen to paper and constructed the novel—one that would stand as a timestamp for young adult literature and is considered by many to be the first official young adult novel.
(This is the part where Richard takes over. It's pretty brilliant if you as me.)
Sometimes adults even like to read young adult novels. Even though they are too old, many adults are too immature to deal with real big-boy problems and find it fascinating that a young adult is able to deal with those problems. Its like hearing that Mozart played the piano at age five. Its shocking and fun to read.
Not only are the books fun to read but they are fun to eat. Eating a book helps one to literally internalize the material. Ancient tribes, coincidentally the ones that feel like cameras suck their souls out, feel that you cannot truly comprehend a book until it has been ingested. One fun project that can be done with students to help them see the benefit in ingesting literature is to have each student eat a book. After the book passes into the student’s stool have them fish out any words or phrases that remain intact and have them recompile them into an entirely new young adult novel of their very own. Many young adult novels have been “inspired” by such means. The series “Twilight” is a perfect example of this technique.
My husband is just the smartest, hottest thing since who knows what. :)
